


The Intimacy of the Doodle

by starboydjh



Series: Artist!Cashby AU [1]
Category: Of Mice & Men (Band)
Genre: Artist AU, I Don't Even Know, Of Mice and Men - Freeform, but i apologize none the less, i don't know where these came from, what, what even is this i'm so sorry, why do i write, wow i suck
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-05-21
Updated: 2014-05-21
Packaged: 2018-01-26 01:23:45
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,785
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1669523
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/starboydjh/pseuds/starboydjh
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Alan really likes to draw Austin at random times. He also doesn't like the word "doodles."</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Intimacy of the Doodle

**Author's Note:**

> So basically this is gonna be a string of AU's where Alan teaches art at a university and Austin is still an active gallery artist. IDK where these came from but who really cares because I like this idea v much. They aren't really connected in that they don't tell a specific story, but I feel like this scenario could be real with them because they're both such creative people. And who doesn't love cute artist couples, amirite? :D
> 
> PS yes Austin actually is deaf in one ear, link to the interview where he mentions it here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rp1TeHUQxfQ#t=322

To artists, there's some faces that just beg to be drawn. Not photographed, drawn. Because when you draw someone, it just feels more intimate, and that's the kind of care these people require, you see. These people have this symmetry about them that is just so captivatingly pure, you would think Fibonacci himself created his golden number just to quantify how gorgeous they actually were. You can't explain it, or even begin to tell someone why, it just happens. You find a photo of them, or see them in a certain state of being, and you just know. These few people have a personality to match too. They're those salt of the earth sorts of people whose beauty was enhanced by the fact that they were good people who loved everyone. Nobody could hate them even if they tried because they're so sweet and don't realise it. To others, they radiate sunshine and goodness and love all the time, and you can't help but love them right back. 

In Alan's mind, Austin was one of these people. He was so lucky to have married someone he thought fit that description perfectly. He could draw Austin anytime he liked. There would be these days that Austin could just be sitting in the green room or in their living room scribbling something in a notebook and humming to himself or onstage with his eyes closed just taking in the energy of the crowd where Alan felt like he needed to get his sketchbook out so he could draw what Austin looked like. He'd never told Austin, but Alan had sketchbook upon sketchbook full of just drawings of Austin. They were full of either quick pencil renderings he wanted to finish, hyper detailed portraits that took days to finish, or even fast scribbled sketches of just his eyes, his smile, the way his hand curled around the neck of a guitar like it was an extension of himself, and everything in between. 

Their house had basically been overtaken by their art anyways, their kitchen sink overflowing with palettes and brushes and cups of coloured water, framed artworks gracing the hallways and rooms that Austin and Alan hadn't painted with murals when they moved in. It was artistic sensory overload in their home, so Alan figured that they didn't need any more artwork. This wasn't even art, really, these were just doodles to take his mind off the stress of the university and finals and his students' constant pestering him about grades and exams and pre rec courses and everything that his job entailed. 

Austin, on the other hand, always loved finding new pieces for their home. This was their living gallery, always growing and changing as their styles grew and changed. He was very particular about what went on their walls, and his tastes changed so frequently that it was a rarity something stayed for longer than a month or so. 

Something of his, at least. Alan's work, those pieces stayed on the walls for at least six months. Even though Alan would always make snarky comments about big fancy words Austin didn't think mattered to art, like the juxtaposition, duality, magisterialism, qualities of things that he couldn't even see. Yes, Alan could be an art snob, but only a minor one, because he had to be for his job. He always said that "if I'm gonna teach modern art to people, I have to talk like an artist," which was true. But Austin always thought Alan could be less critical of himself and loosen up a bit, even before he took the job at the university. His art was like him, hyper focused and obsessive about every detail being just the way he envisioned it. 

That's why, when Austin was looking through Alan's shelves on the bookcases in their living room for a certain box of colours he'd mixed a few days ago, he was surprised to find one of Alan's sketchbooks that had unfinished doodles, tour late 2013-early 2014 written on the front cover. 

"Doodles? What...?" Austin muttered to himself. Alan hated that word, doodles. Alan always said: “Everything an artist creates has a purpose, there's no room for doodles. You're always creating, growing, learning from yourself, so nothing that comes from your own head is so worthless that it can't be finished.” To Alan, calling something a scribble was better than calling something a doodle, because a scribble could become something else, while a doodle was done and never being touched again. In his state of confusion, Austin opened the sketchbook to see what gave Alan the audacity to be so hypocritical and call something he made an unfinished doodle. 

It was pages and pages of drawings of Austin's legs. The tattoos he had, how he'd bend them when he was onstage, how they looked when they were tangled in Alan's after they made love, any time he could think of was documented in the first twenty or so pages. And these clearly weren't part of a study on legs either. Another portion of the sketchbook was full of his hands, his eyes, his smile, his tattoos, everything. Random old day sheets were folded into the sketchbooks from tour with quick scribbles of moments in time for Alan to remember and finish later, again all of Austin. In some of the newer ones, there were full-blown portraits in pen and ink (Alan's favorite medium) that must've taken hours and hours of work to finish that almost made Austin want to cry, they were so beautiful. Then there were the watercolour portraits from when Alan wanted to mix it up and try what he called "satan's medium" for a change. 

Austin lost track of the time looking at everything he found on the shelf, four sketchbooks, two months worth of old tour schedules, a week's worth of university lesson plans, and a watercolour pad full of pieces of him, parts of himself he didn't like that Alan somehow made him love. He'd never liked his legs before, they'd been a source of constant teasing when he was younger, but now he could see how someone could see them as long and elegant the way Alan did. He didn't like the scar of bare flesh running through his tattoos on his chest, it reminded him of darker times in his life, but Alan saw it as strength and renewal. How his left foot turned in more than his right, it wasn't gawky and awkward, it was cute and quirky. And his long arms, those were beautiful and strong instead of gangly and disproportionate. There was something so intimate about them, as if Austin shouldn't have been looking at them, but he couldn't stop looking at them either. 

"Austin, I'm home!" Alan called over the quiet acoustic music playing through the house. "Where are ya?"

"Living room!" Austin called back, looking helplessly at the floor where he had all the papers and sketchbooks spread out, almost willing them back into their spot. 

"Hey, how was- what are you doing?" Alan could feel his face going hot with embarrassment, oh no Austin found the sketches. "How'd you find those?"

"I was um- I was looking for that box of paints I mixed the other day... why haven't I seen these before?"

Alan marched over to him, his face as red as his hair, and took the sketchbook out of Austin's hands. "Because they're all really bad, they're the only thing I'll ever call doodles," Alan muttered as he knelt down to pick up the loose papers off the floor, even though Austin had seen all of them already. God, he probably looked like such a freak now. It was creepy, he was just realizing to have four sketchbooks full of drawings of your husband, no matter how beautiful you thought he was or if you were an artist or not. Normal people didn't just do that. "I'm sorry, I know it's really creepy of me-"

"How is helping me love myself more creepy?" Austin asked. "The way you can take something about myself that I hate and translate it into something beautiful with pens and a piece of paper is beyond me, but you managed to do it. The drawings of my legs and of my awkward left foot- a-and my scar, and my deaf ear, I just," Austin was at a loss for words. "You're kind of incredible, you know." 

"I'm not incredible or amazing or any of that, I just know art when I see it." Alan still wouldn't look Austin in the eye. He was hugging one of the sketchbooks to his chest, his eyes trained on his all black "work" Converse. "And to me, you're the epitome of art."

"Do I need fancy words that you know I don't understand to describe me?" Austin asked with a smirk on his face. Alan smiled too, then looked up at Austin with warmth and love in his eyes. 

"No. Just four: You're so fucking perfect." 

"How?"

Alan picked up the sketchbooks and flipped through all the pages and explained why he drew what he did on each page to Austin. There were so many reasons to love himself, so many things he didn't notice that Alan did. That's one of the many reasons Austin considered Alan a far more talented artist than he was. He noticed these things about others that they themselves didn't, and could capture those qualities from memory too. From what Austin could tell, there were no reference photos in any of these books, nothing to work off of other than a perfect mental snapshot of himself and the body that carried him around every day. 

They ended up sat on the living room floor, Alan in Austin's lap with his eyes alight, as if he actually enjoyed talking about his doodles. "Oh and this one, you were sitting there in the studio playing guitar, and I liked the way your body was like the perfect reverse of Phil's, because of how you're left handed and he's right handed, I'm surprised you didn't notice me drawing you. This one took me all day. You were really into the music though so that's probably why."

"I saw you drawing, I just didn't know what, but you looked really into it so I didn't want to bother you." Alan turned the page again, pointing out the little details of what he'd drawn. This was so intimate, so personal, and so fitting for tonight for no reason at all that Alan could learn to see the beauty of a doodle. Maybe he'd use that word a tiny bit more often. Only when it applied to Austin, though.


End file.
